Snakes—Everywhere

I’ve been doing the Aussie bush block thing this autumn. It’s the usual thing, clearing up, burning off and eating badly cooked sausages.   

But this year, I keep seeing snakes everywhere.  Seems like dozens of them. Don’t know about you, but I’ve always hated snakes. Cold slimy things, like lawyers without the nice suits. 

So, I do what you do in these situations.  I ring my wife to come and take care of the problem.   I’ve seen that woman stride out there, barefooted and barelegged.  On the way, she tears a twig from a tree, pins the bastards down, tosses them in a bag and gives ‘em such a scare we never see them again. 

Whenever we get in an argument, she just looks around for a twig.

Anyway, she’s not answering, so I have to ring those guys at reptile removals. You know about these people: for 20 bucks a head, they come and take care of the Joe Blakes.

I tell him I’ve got a real predicament, never seen so many snakes.  Lay it on pretty thick. But when time comes for the crunch question, he says he can’t get there until next week at the earliest.  It’s busy, he says. I picked up twenty five just this week.

Okay, I say, next week will have to do.  And by the way, what do you do with the snakes?  

They’re a very important part of the food chain around here, he starts to say.  You eat them? I ask, completely misunderstanding this circle of life thing.

No. no. no.  We relocate them, take them into the bush well away from where we find them, and put them back into the wild.  

There’s a nice spot five kays up Van Morey Road near the quarry, he adds.  There’s water there beside the road, and plenty of space.  So that’s where we let them go. 

It’s his turn to ask me a question.  He needs to know my address.  So where are these little buggers?  he asks.  Am I going to have problem finding this place of yours?  

No. no. no.  You’ll have no problem at all, I say. My place is five kays up Van Morey Road.  You’ll find them in a nice little spot, right there beside the road.